


After The Last Vow

by BlasphemousProphet



Category: Sherlock (TV), johnlock - Fandom
Genre: Happy Ending, M/M, Post HLV
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-07-04
Updated: 2014-07-04
Packaged: 2018-02-07 10:11:58
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,731
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1895184
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BlasphemousProphet/pseuds/BlasphemousProphet
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Takes place immediately after The Last Vow 3x03 BBC Sherlock. Johnlock reconciliation. For people who need closure (like me). Work in progress.</p>
            </blockquote>





	After The Last Vow

It was all a blur for Sherlock, being ushered off the plane, getting into one of Mycroft’s cars with John and Mary, being dropped off at 221B Baker Street with an ankle bracelet and police detail.  
“Stay with him,” said Mary.  
“You sure?” asked John.  
“Apologies, my brother needs his rest. Me and him need to have words,” said Mycroft, leaning on his cane. Sherlock was staring at the smiley face on the wall, saying nothing.  
“Sherlock? Should I come back later?” asked John. Sherlock barely shrugged.  
“What is going on?”  
“In what sense?”  
“You shot Charles Augusten Magnussen in the head yesterday. Why?”  
Sherlock was quiet.  
“You know what I told John the first time we met? I said ‘my brother is cold but he isn’t a killer.’ You proved me wrong.”  
“That’s a first.” Sherlock’s voice sounded rusty.  
“Whatever Magnussen had on Mary is gone. That have anything to do with it?”  
“A happy coincidence.”  
“Take off your coat, Sherlock.”  
“I prefer to keep it on.”  
“This is your home.”  
“Who knows how long I’ll be here?”  
“As long as Moriarty is, you will be.”  
“And then?”  
“I don’t know.”  
“So why take off the coat?”  
“Alright, Sherlock.”  
They sat in a silent détente, both of them silently acknowledging the obvious; they had been outclassed, Sherlock by love, Mycroft by ignorance, the Holmes brothers defeated by forces even they could not control.

Give my best to Mary. That was what Sherlock had said before he…shot Magnussen. John couldn’t stop thinking about it.  
“You were my hero. And then…you got shot. And you were wrong about Magnussen. And you killed him for Mary.”  
“I’m just a man, John.”  
“I thought you were more than that. You came back from the dead-“  
“I was never dead. Just hiding.”  
“You came back for me.”  
“Yes.”  
“What were you going to say to me at the airport?”  
Sherlock shook his head. “It doesn’t matter.”  
“It matters to me. You matter to me. You’re still the cleverest man I’ve ever known. You’re still my best friend.”  
Sherlock cleared his throat. “Mary’s not pregnant. I was wrong about that too.”  
“I know,” said John, surprising Sherlock. “We took a pregnancy test that night. She was only faking it to…keep me there.”  
“And you’re still there?”  
“She shot you. You aren’t a psychopath-“  
“High functioning sociopath.”  
“You aren’t that either.”  
“I wanted to be,” said Sherlock huskily.  
“Why?”  
Sherlock was assaulted by a wave of images; Redbeard, Victor Trevor, John forcing him to eat, John reminding him to bathe, moving John’s chair into his room after John was gone, seeing John at his grave, hearing John’s scream as he watched Sherlock fall, John grabbing Moriarty to rescue Sherlock, John, John, John…  
“You know what my mind palace is?”  
John shook his head.  
“It’s that house where we discovered the lady from A Study in Pink. The first case we ever did. Those twisted stairs.”  
This was Sherlock’s way of telling John that he was important to him. John tried to control his hand from twitching.  
“I never needed a roommate in 221B. Mrs Hudson and I, our special deal was that I could only stay in this place if I got a roommate. I could choose anyone I liked or…anyone who liked me. It took me a while to find…that.”  
“I didn’t know that.”  
“You don’t have to help me with this Moriarty case.”  
“I want to.”  
“It doesn’t matter. He already won. He burned the heart out of me.”  
“What do you mean?”  
“I’m going to bed.”

“You were his heart and it destroyed Sherlock to see you marry someone else. Didn’t you ever wonder why he put up with your crabbiness or constant parade of women through the place? Why he was always so bored when he wasn’t on a case with you? Why he never ate, except with you? Why he bought four of the same purple shirts when he saw you liked the way they looked? Why he went back to using the minute you were married?”  
“Mycroft, I-“  
“We’ve both made mistakes. Yours can still be fixed.”  
“What do you mean?”  
“Think about it.”  
“What’s going to happen to Sherlock after he defeats Moriarty?”  
Mycroft turned to leave. “Not if, John? Not if he defeats Moriarty? You still have faith in him after all this time?”  
By the time John looked up Mycroft was gone.

John knocked on Sherlock’s door, three timid, evenly paced knocks, the opposite of his usual staccato rapping. The room Janine had emerged from in nothing but a shirt. The room where Sherlock thought alone. His last place.  
“Come in,” called Sherlock, his back to the door. “Thank God, Mrs. Hudson. I could use some tea.”  
“It’s me.”  
“John.”  
“I haven’t been here for you. I’m sorry.”  
Sherlock was crumpled up on the floor and a needle slipped out of his grasp.  
“Fuck! Sherlock, what is this?”  
The card said COMPLIMENTS OF MORIARTY and Sherlock’s eyes attempted to focus themselves on John even as they slowly closed.

“What…’  
“You’re in the hospital, Sherlock,” said Molly, gently adjusting his oxygen tank. “You overdosed on a 13% solution.”  
“Not the…usual?” Sherlock croaked.  
“7%? No.”  
John was sleeping in a chair next to Sherlock’s bed.  
“He’s been here since you were transferred here. Sherlock, you promised me-“  
“Molly.”  
Molly drew back, afraid of the naked look in his eyes.

Molly came over holding my stag night folder.

“You forgot this at the lab,” Molly almost whispers, thrusting the folder at me (we held it like a newborn cat (both so wary))

“Are you okay?” asks Molly.

“Just tired,” I say, voice rusty from disuse.

“How is the case going?”

“What case? I’m on house arrest.”

“I’m sorry everything went so wrong,” said Molly.

“I was wrong,” I remind her.

Molly sat down on the couch cautiously.

“I know how it feels to love someone who doesn’t love you back,” she says gently. “You feel like you don’t deserve to be loved, like no one will love you ever again. That feeling will go away.”

“How long will that take?”

“Give it some time,” said Molly.

“Thank you for coming,” I tell Molly formally.

“Would you like to watch some crap telly?” she asks me.

“Not really.”

“It’s good for you. You’ll heal faster.”

I curl up against Molly, predicting every character’s next move, analyzing the camera angles and color schemes, eventually falling asleep.

 

Molly (the first?) person to let me know I could make a mistake. The only person who believed I was human. Even John (John!) believed I was some kind of mystery solving machine (could such a thing be created?) John. John. When would I stop thinking about him? would he visit his disastrous junkie friend during his house arrest? John, good, loyal, patient, generous…he would come 4.3% of his time (if I was lucky).

John was the first to realize that I loved being Sherlock Holmes (though my love for him exceeded even that).

“I don’t want to be Sherlock Holmes anymore,” I mumble.

“I know,” whispers Molly. My face is wet. “Promise you’ll stay away from the drugs,” she adds.

I am silent. I don’t want to lie to Molly, who is swiftly realizing she is in over her head.

“I have a shift at the hospital (she does, I know her schedule) but should I come back later?”

“No need.”

“Call me before you…”

Molly trails off and leaves me alone in a dark apartment. It isn’t home without John. I can’t sleep until he returns. I can’t sleep unless I hear him rustling around at night. I can’t sleep unless he says good night to me. I can’t sleep until he forces me to eat dinner. I can’t sleep without him. I can’t.

I watch John run into Molly from the window of the apartment. My stomach when she shoves (Molly never shoves) the folder in his hand. I read her lips. She is calling him the Vitruvian Man. John opens the folder and never come inside but I watch him from the window for hours (as Mycroft likely does with the street cameras. Bastard.)

Text from John.

_Are you alright?_

Sweet John. My blogger, my partner, my soulmate. Come inside and I’ll never leave this apartment again. Come inside and I’ll never experiment again. Come inside and I’ll play my violin. Watch boring movies with you. Buy the milk. Come inside.

_What I said to you at the plane wasn’t what I wanted to say._

_Sherlock, I can’t do this right now. I’m going to have a daughter. She’s my priority._

I was once your priority, I want to tell him. I want nothing more than to be that skull sitting in John’s chair across from me.

“You were gone for three years!” John yells from the street. “You can’t come back and expect me to still be waiting for you!”

_Three years ago would have been different?_

_Does it matter?_

_John, I’m an idiot._

I watch John read my text and look up at my window. His eyes are oddly bright.

_I can’t do it like this._

_I understand._

_I’m sorry._

_I love you. In whichever way you want me to. That’s all I wanted to say._

John kneels to the ground on the sidewalk, as though I have jumped, as though he is attempting CPR on my shadow.

 _Platonically_ , I add.

_I can’t see you right now._

_Okay._

_If I did I wouldn’t be able to control myself. I would grab you and kiss you a thousand times and betray my wife in as many ways as I could._

_But you can’t._

_I love you too, Sherlock._

_Good night, John._

_Good night, Sherlock._

“There’s something I always wanted to tell you,” Sherlock whispered to a sleeping John.  
“I love you too,” said John.  
Sherlock found John’s hand in the darkness and held it tightly.  
“I’ll take care of you,” said John.  
“I’ll never leave again.”  
“We’ll get old and fat together.”  
“Solving cases.”  
“Solving cases.’  
“I love you,” said Sherlock.  
“I love you.”  
“Come here.”  
“Are you crying?”  
“I’m…happy.”  
Mycroft found John and Sherlock wrapped in a tight embrace in the hospital bed the next morning, presiding over them with a slight smile. He had never seen his brother sleep so deeply.


End file.
